


Kisame/Obito(/Rin) Soulmate Things

by RoeDusk



Category: Naruto
Genre: Multi, Soulmates, multiple AUs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-30
Updated: 2016-10-30
Packaged: 2018-08-27 20:57:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 9
Words: 15,834
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8416453
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RoeDusk/pseuds/RoeDusk
Summary: A thank you for blackkat's stories and inspired by their recent Drabble Collection.  
A bunch of Kisame/Obito things to flesh out their nonexistent tag here.   Only... they're both self destructive and Kisame's an enabler, so sometimes there's Rin so they don't all end up tragedies.





	1. Dreams and Ghosts

**Author's Note:**

  * For [blackkat](https://archiveofourown.org/users/blackkat/gifts).

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Soulmates dream each other’s lives if they’re asleep when the other is awake, and soulmates haunt each other after they die.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trying to stop with [Kisame's Kids](http://archiveofourown.org/works/8298160) didn't work... 
> 
> Sorry for any angst in advance. Not sorry for Orochimaru's invasion in the later chapters.

****Obito dreams of staying up late to sneak in a few hours more of an adventure novel, of pretending to heal stuffed animals from any and all injuries, and telling an older teen that he wanted to grow up to be a Senju Princess just like Tsunade. When he naps during the day he dreams of children’s anatomy books, wrapping an older man's arm again and again for practice, or just hanging out with family.

It’s a window into a life with parents, cousins, and a child’s dream being slowly shaped into something a ninja could use. Obito learns to wake up when the dreams are of getting out of bed to pull another day off the calendar. And he counts down the days until the start of the Academy alongside his soulmate.

He learns it’s Rin when he falls asleep during a lecture, and he dreams of the teacher throwing an eraser at his head right before it hits and wakes him up. Looking over, he realizes his best friend and his soulmate are one in the same. It’s a good feeling, and he’s excited to tell Grandmother about it when he gets home.

But she never seems to realize he’s her soulmate in return. Not even when they’re put on the same Genin team and take turns on watch while out on missions. She should know he’s her soulmate by the order of the watch alone, but nothing. No matter how hard he tries to prove he knows her likes and dislikes better than just a friend should she keeps watching Kakashi thoughtfully.

Minato-Sensei gives him a worried look when he asks if it’s possible for someone to be your soulmate but not to be theirs. They talk about it privately and he agrees that Rin would never knowingly be that cruel, but he’s never heard of something like that happening before.

“It’s not as though ninja are generally open about soulmates though,” the older man admits and Obito deflates. “Maybe she never gets far enough into REM sleep to dream, some sort of sleep disorder. Or maybe she’s mistaking you for Kakashi because she sees the things you like to do or think about late at night and doesn’t connect them with her friend? I don’t know, but I doubt she could be your soulmate without you being hers.”

Obito decides to take that as encouragement, and decides he’ll just have to win her over without the dreams. If he spends the next few watches mouthing ‘my name is Obito’ over and over, well no one needed to know that.

 

* * *

 

Rin has dreamed of combat as long as she can remember. Sneaking out in the dead of night to practice sword styles when she was young, only to shift into actual missions as she got older. Then, just as she was reaching graduation, they stopped.

It didn’t matter, she already knew he soulmate was a ninja who could wield a blade like an extension of his limbs. But why had the missions stopped the same year she graduated? Was her soulmate doing something else in the day now, so they needed to sleep at night. She was tempted to take a midday nap to be sure, but there were D-Ranks to do, and a team to learn to work with. Obito managed to be her partner on this new team, and they worked as well together as they always had, but Kakashi had trouble adjusting to others following in his wake rather than just doing everything himself.

Come to think of it, there were rumors in the Academy that Kakashi hadn’t had to attend some of the lessons because he was a genius shinobi, that ANBU had already recruited him as a member, and that only the black ops’ secrecy was preventing him from receiving the ranking his skills earned him. If those rumors were true, then he would have been taking missions in the evenings after school, only stopping recently when he was assigned to a genin team in preparation for attending the chunin exams.

As war preparations picked up around the world, and ninja began coming out of the shadows to work in the light of day, Rin watched her white-haired teammate and wondered. And through it all her dreams remained silent.

 

* * *

 

Kisame dreams of the sun after he graduates the academy. Joining the Kiri swordsman corps immediately afterwards meant training in the worst circumstances his teachers could devise, all to see if he’d wash out or make it through. And once he stumbled home, exhausted, he’d barely have the time to rinse off before he was falling into bed and passing out. Then he would dream of sunshine, an elderly mother who actually cared what happened to her boy one way or another, and the loss of being alone in a clan that just seemed to despise personality.

When he graduated from training and grunt work to information guarding and assassination missions, Kisame took the dawn watch after they stopped, then dreamed of a girl, school that didn’t seem to be training much of anything, and the aching loneliness of the one you loved not looking your way. Considering the brunet in question Kisame had to admit his soul mate would probably be better of with her in the long run, but it didn’t make it sting less that he’d had this boy for less than half his life and already he was losing him.

When the war started and Kiri’s swordsmen were sent out to make a show of force, Kisame lost the sunlight dreams. Every now and then he’d catch a snippet when he fell into bed at night, sitting on watch the same way he would be in a few hours, and lonely in the silence, so painfully lonely. ‘My name is Obito’ the kid mouthed a few times, long enough for Kisame to get a conscious feel for how his own lips moved to decypher it. Kisame wondered who Obito hoped was listening, and didn’t bother to reply.

 

* * *

* * *

 

There’s a moment when she dies, where her soul has pulled away from her body but the 3 tails is struggling to keep her from leaving, trying to heal the dead. And it's that moment when Kakashi faints and Obito comes bursting out of the bushes. Maybe if she were still alive she wouldn't have recognized him, but his soul was clear. Rin managed one last thought, startled recognition and relief that Kakashi would survive, then the world went black as she shook the last little bit free.

She wakes with a gasp, taking in the sparse apartment with a glance. “We have to go back. Obito's alive!”.

“Well, that’s certainly splendid to have verified,” an unfamiliar voice drawled, “But I already knew that.”

Startled, Rin spun to face the speaker, ending up face-to-face with a blue skinned stranger. But the room and his gear were familiar, echoes of dreams she'd had for years. She'd thought… or no, she’d convinced herself through wishful thinking because she wanted to belong to her quiet teammate.

“You’re not Kakashi,” she realized sadly.

“Fortunate for me,” he replied, grinning at her with all his teeth. She hesitated for a moment, but this was important.

“Well, if you’ve been dreaming of me then you must know Obito. He’s my best friend, and we thought he died but he didn’t. He’s alive, and he was there trying to save us from those Kiri nin chasing us when I died…”

“I didn’t, dream of you that is,” the blue man cut her off. “In fact, when I dreamed at all it was of 'Obito’.”

That threw her, how could her soulmate be bonded to someone else? But that wasn’t important at the moment. “Then you _really_ have to help him. He’s in trouble and he’s your soulmate!”

The older ninja three back his head and laughed. “You think it’s that simple? Being soulmates crosses all boundaries and means he should be my first priority in everything?”

“You were made for each other,” Rin informed him icilly. “He’s alone and hurting, someone needs to bring him home, and you’re the only one who knows he’s out there. You should want him to be happy.”

“And you think I’d make him happy?” He scoffed. “If you were worried about happy you would have settled down with him yourself. He was always watching, hoping you'd notice, but you never did.”

“Maybe I did, but… he wasn’t my soulmate,” Rin said, looking away.

“Is that what they're teaching you in Konoha these days? How many ninja do you actually see with their soulmates? If we’re lucky our soulmate exists in the same village, but maybe they’re not the right power level or gender to carry on a clan bloodline, or we’re not. Maybe they’ll just be used as a means to keep control over a powerful tool. And if they’re from a rival village then, well, you’re either a traitor or an information leak. Better not to admit anything and work on remedying the problem as soon as possible.”

“You mean kill them.”

“Or start working on defecting,” the blue man shrugged. “Making sure no one ever knows who your soulmate is is also pretty popular.”

“There are popular and unpopular ways of dealing with enemy soulmates?”

“Well, kidnapping’s hard to pull off successfully, so no one does it anymore. Killing yourself so you can haunt your soulmate is easier than finding a way to life together, but most ninja see that as a coward's way out. What else… some of the worst assassins I know deliberately killed their soulmate, since they felt there was no way to be together otherwise, and they can’t leave if they’re haunting you at least. On the extreme end there’s some of the worst killers who don’t know who their soulmate might be but slaughter as many people as they can just to make sure they get them. Can’t say it’s all that common though.”

She stared at him in shock for a moment, then shook her head, “I never noticed any of that in Konoha, but some of it must be true. You couldn’t have the Jonin Commander leaking information across the battle lines after all.” Being forced to change her worldview was hardly how she’d expected her haunting to go. “Which were you?” She asked after a moment’s thought. He looked away.

…

“Live and let live,” he replied after a long silence. “He would have been happy if you let him, no need to worry about it any further than that. Safer if I never have to choose.”

Better to pretend not to care than risk breaking your own heart, Rin realized. And, maybe she had been doing the same thing, hoping Kakashi was her soulmate, ignoring the little details that should have shown it was impossible.

“Thank you.”

He just shrugged.

 

* * *

 

His name is Kisame, and he’s been a tool against those he should care about for years, killing his heart against more than just a foreign soulmate. Rin watches him struggle to justify each death even as they pile up, and lends an ear the few times he needs someone who just understands. Other times she stays silent, or offers a few tips on healing jutsu if the mission went really wrong.

It’s already bad by the time he becomes Fuguki’s favorite attack dog, but that’s when it becomes destructive. Rin wants to scream to at him to stop, let the cypher division get captured and stop killing, maybe even turn traitor himself because Konoha is _better_. But she’s not sure anymore.

Kisame asked her once how many foreign shinobi she’d seen in Konoha. She can only remember one, and Kushina’d had to lose her entire village to be welcome. If Kisame turned himself over to Ibiki he’d be interrogated, tortured, and likely killed without ever being welcomed into the Hidden Leaf. They just couldn’t afford to take in everyone who promised to switch sides, let alone risking anyone Kiri would kill to get back. And he couldn’t let them catch the Cypher Division or he’d lose his place in Kiri, not to mention doom those ninja to torture and death. Either way he would stain his soul.

But she was happy to help him spy on his boss, corner him over the secrets he was selling to Konoha while forcing Kisame to kill to keep others. She may even have cheered him on some when he ripped the man apart.

Kisame threw his sword aside, not a companion any longer but a dark spirit reminding him of all the lies he killed for. He pulled the great sword Samehada from Fuguki’s corpse and threw it over his shoulder. To the victor goes the spoils, and he would need a blade of his own. What was their friendship doing to her morality?

“We need to leave before anyone comes after you,” she told him instead. Kisame gave the body a final kick and hummed his agreement. Then the Mizukage spoke and stepped from the shadows.

“You think I killed him just to serve as another’s puppet?” Kisame demanded with a smile. “If you truly trust me to see this world of lies for what it really is, then you know I’ve realized there’s nothing for me here. Feel free to try and convince me otherwise, but it’d better be something good or a fight because we were never planning to stick around and see how this ends.”

A hesitation, then a second figure moved in the shadows. “Allow me free you from the pain of those falsehoods. To create a place where you can belong. As I said, I can trust you because you too want to rid us of this world of lies.”

“Who are you?” Kisame asked lowly, not quite threatening, not yet. But the stranger behind the Mizukage continued to talk of what they could accomplish together. The voice was unfamiliar, and his form was strange, but Rin felt like she’d seen that soul before. She was just outside of visible range though, and loath to move from Kisame’s side.

“You seem to be willing to put your trust in me,” Kisame growled, reaching for Samehada’s blade. “But I can’t reciprocate since I still have no idea who you are.”

A glimmer in the shadow, and a sharingan eye opened. Rin started as Kisame grinned.

“A single sharingan in the darkness,” the older ninja mused, “You used it to control the Mizukage. It seems it really was you all along then.”

“Obito…” Rin breathed, frozen at the realization for a moment. Then she glared at Kisame, “You knew he was here.”

“I had a suspicion,” Kisame agreed, grinning wider as the sharingan eye narrowed in confusion. “Well then, how about you tell me your name?”

“Madara Uchiha,” Obito replied and Rin rolled her eyes. Kisame was still grinning.

“Everyone knows that Madara is dead. No… try Obito Uchiha.”

Obito froze at that. “How did you hear that name?”

“Step into the light and see,” Kisame taunted. Rin glanced down automatically, calculating distances, and that would take them into range of each other. But whatever had happened to Obito since she died had made him tense, and he looked just as likely to attack as obey the request. She prepared to leap between them if that should happen, he’d stop for her.

But it turned out not to be necessary. Obito let out a tense breath and stepped forward once, twice, then stopped, eyes wide. “Rin…?”

“You can see me,” the young woman realized with a relieved smile, darting across the space between them for a hug. Obito froze at the contact before leaning into her neck.

“But, when you died and never showed I thought… how…?”

“Let me guess, you dreamed of her?” Kisame interrupted, but he didn’t come closer, and Rin could feel Obito tense at the accusation.

“What would it matter to you?” the scarred Uchiha growled, lifting his head to frown at Kisame. And suddenly all she could think of was the older man’s words all those years ago, about how they would have been happier without him.

“He dreamed of you,” Rin cut in before anyone else could speak. “And I dreamed of him.”

“Each with only one part of the soulmate package, so it looks like you’re stuck with us for a while,” Kisame grinned in challenge. “What’s the plan?”

“That’s why you never noticed…” Obito realized, eyes widening as he looked from Kisame to Rin. Then he shook himself, “Well, first we need to clean up Kiri and gain a foothold. Once that’s done I was planning to form an organization of S-Ranked Missing Nin to hunt down the tailed beasts…”

“You WHAT?!” Rin shouted. Obito flinched, rubbing his ear as she dropped him in disbelief. Kisame barely twitched, but he was a little further away.

“Rin, ow! What…?”

“Oh no, we are starting with a proper medical exam. Why is your skin two different colors? How did you even _survive_ what looks like half your body becoming scar tissue? And then you’ll explain why you need _9_ tailed beasts for _any_ plan that’s not going to lead to _hundreds_ if not _thousands_ of people dead!”

 


	2. What's in a Name

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Where your soulmate's name appears in your wrist when you 'come of age'. Sometime late teens usually. And the name changes to reflect your view of yourself.

Soulmates are taboo in Kiri, just another weakness to be overcome, an absolute no one acknowledges or talk about. Supposedly. As with all forbidden things ninja talk about them for the thrill, to scare the young or superstitious, or to tempt fate.

Someone had to explain why arm warmers that got in the way _all the time_ were standard uniform.

Besides, even as a kid he knew enough to read between the lines. Anyone from Kiri was someone he’d rather not have as a soul mate. Whether to have them used against him or because the whole village was populated by sadists. Anyone outside the village would make him a traitor, and he’d be killed. Better not to look.

So he bought the ridiculous arm-warmers, wore them on missions and off, didn’t bother looking at his arm to see if he’d come of age yet. In the end he missed the name’s appearance entirely, only noticing it days later in the shower after mission success. What about that mission meant he’d come of age, he wondered? Not that it mattered a name was a name, he wasn’t planning to do anything about it.

Especially since ‘Obito’ was hardly local.

 

* * *

 

Years passed with no one looking for him. Seemed his soulmate must be a bit younger, or as pragmatic as he was about the whole thing. Kisame ignored the letters branded on his wrist, killed his way into the upper ranks of the sword corps, went about life like he didn’t have a soul to worry about.

Then the name changed, a tingling burning sensation of souls testing each other and realigning. ‘Madara’ his arm said now. A change of name drastic enough to shape the soul of his potential partner. But still compatible. Kisame didn’t know how to feel about that, or the name referencing one of the best known Konoha nin from the history books.

Still didn’t know how he felt when a stranger with one sharingan eye stepped from the shadows and introduced himself by _that_ name.

So he just grinned and decided to give it a shot. What were the odds?

The kid didn’t seem to recognise his name at all. Maybe he was a late bloomer, or maybe he didn’t like what he saw and refused to acknowledge their bond. Maybe he too was pragmatic about it. Kisame didn’t know, didn’t bother trying the old name once just to make a point. He wouldn’t want someone waving his past around either.

 

* * *

 

They separated, fleeing Kiri after Yagura shook off his partner’s genjutsu control. Kisame spent weeks dodging patrols, losing all pursuers, and making himself known to the Akatsuki per orders. He’d just earned his place when the name on his wrist shattered. Pulling up his sleeve (no arm warmers anymore, felt odd) he watched as the ink bled into shards, then hesitated a moment before reforming again.

‘Tobi’. Still the same guy, another name. And still a fit.

He wasn’t sure whether to be flattered someone out there matched him so well that even losing their identity couldn’t break the bond, or concerned someone that broken was right for him.

In the end it didn’t matter. Tobi joined weeks later, still with nothing he wanted to say, and they existed as they had before. Their comrades swelled in number, met great success, then fell one by one. Tobi was one of the lost, and Kisame spent more time than he’d like stopping just short of checking to see if the name had been replaced yet.

In the end he was one of the last, and Tobi came back from the dead to send him on one last mission. Kisame smiled and agreed. Maybe he wasn't this man’s match he decided, as the words on his arm burned and shifted back again. But Madara/Tobi/(Obito) had given him meaning when he'd just been a tool refusing to die. That was good enough for him.

 

* * *

* * *

 

Obito never saw his soulmate’s name. Not yet of age when he nearly died, and afterwards no letters showed on the grafted skin with another’s DNA.

Even when Madara died and he took up the man’s mantle, laying agonized on a shabby bedroll as his wrist burned, trying to decide if his soul still matched its earlier soul mate, nothing appeared. He never even knew if he’d lost a soulmate and gained another, or if he never had a second one at all.

He assumed he had, or it wouldn’t have hurt so much to give up Madara, to give up Tobi, but even when he woke up an emotional wreck and tried to scrape the skin off his wrist there was nothing there.

And then they died. The soulmate he’d never found, never quite believed in, left him alone without ever having met them.

And his wrist didn’t stop burning until he followed.

 


	3. Red, Yellow, and Blue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The one where seeing your soulmate shows you color.

When she was young Rin saw entirely in shades of red. Not that she knew it was red she was seeing, just that everyone who hadn’t met their soulmate was missing colors so she must be too. She doesn’t remember when she met Obito, or that her world was lacking yellow and orange before he came into her life. She’s forgotten what her Red world looked like, or that she had it at all. She just knows she can’t tell the difference between the color of trees, water, or the sky, so she must not have found her soulmate yet.

 

* * *

 

Obito saw in yellows before he met Rin. He remembers the surprise and rush as red seeped into his world, how her hair went from an almost sickly brown to something warmer, redder. And some of his clothes were _orange_ now, he thinks that’s his favorite color of all. In school there’s a chart handed out in sex-ed class, with the color wheel on it. All different colors but the same brightness and shade, so he knows he can’t see the difference in anything from purple to green, but it doesn’t matter. He’s not greedy, and two soulmates is almost too much for him to hope for, especially when Rin is already perfect for him. Their second match can be worse, terrible even if they want, as long as they make Rin happy.

He just wishes she’d look at him as more than just her childhood best friend sometimes, instead of looking for their third soulmate all the time.

 

* * *

 

Kisame sees in blues. Not that he’s concerned about color either way, but he likes to think he’s an expert on what water looks like, living in Kiri for so long, and he’s more right than he knows.

Then he’s on night patrol in the borderlands, a milk run watching for spies before his next mission, and passes by an assault group on their way back to base. Color bleeds into his world suddenly when he glances at their captive, the leaves and water are still the same but there’s something deeper, more alive in the tree trunks, and when the moonlight shines on the injured ninja’s arm the blood is an entirely new color.

Red, he remembers, blood is supposed to be red.

He hesitates for a moment longer before stepping out of the shadows and into the way, a toothy grin stretching across his face. “And who might you be? We’re having problems with spies trying to slip across the border, so you might want to identify yourselves.”

The ninja in front hesitates, glancing back at the one who must be the leader. The mask shakes his head. “Need to know only, word of this can’t get back to the Mizukage. Take him out.”

“Mistake,” Kisame taunts, grin wide and threatening as he leans into his sword. They leap at him, trying to take him off guard but his sword is drawn before they can reach him, and the last ninja falling to an explosive kunai before they can react.

He gives them an extra stab to make sure they’re dead before moving to the kunoichi’s side. She working on getting her fingers loose in the commotion, and he can see her furrowed brow even with the blindfold. A Konoha headband, maybe this is why there’s no place he belonged in Kiri, why they kept making him kill his own?

“I’m going to take off the blindfold now,” he tells her, “Try not to gut me with that hidden blade, alright?” She freezes mid attempt to pull it out of her sash and he takes the opportunity to pull the blindfold off.

 

He’s _blue_. A Kiri ninja, an enemy even if he might have just killed his own comrades to save her, but he’s _blue_. And that means something incredible. In fact, it’s nighttime, there’s blue _everywhere_. How did she live this long without a color that made up so much of half the day?

He’s watching her cautiously, waiting for revulsion maybe, or an attack, since they’re still on opposite sides of the war. Or maybe he’s seeing in her the same new colors she sees in him and can’t look away either.

But they’re not allies, no agreements or duties between them except for knowing their soulmates. And soulmates can and do kill each other, it happens in tragic stories of war all the time, and more often in life. Even if most soulmates come from the same villages and careers there’s always exceptions. So she pulls herself together, cuts herself free and puts a yard of space between them, blade out.

“Are you trying to become an ally or just not to be an enemy?”

“You think your Konoha would take a defector?” He replies with a slow grin. A challenge. “An ugly attack dog sent after traitors, I haven’t belonged to Kiri in a long time.”

“Hardly ugly,” she scoffs, frowning. “But, as to the rest… If you mean it, I can _make_ it happen. Or, at least, sensei can.”

“Then I’d better get you back in one peace,” he teased, pulling off his forehead protector as he stood. A moment’s hesitation, then he was holding it out to her. “You should probably keep this, as proof of my surrender.”

She accepted it silently, running a hand over the polished metal before putting it in her pocket. It felt the same as hers, worn and lightweight, but heavy at the same time. Then he offered her a handful of kunai and explosive tags.

“For emergencies,” he said when she glanced at him. “Can you run?”

“I’m fine, and you’ll catch me if I’m not. Let’s go.”

“Yes ma’am,” he laughed, and they set off, back into the shadows.

 

* * *

* * *

 

**Bonus:**

“Let me guess, you’re the same as I was,” Kisame spoke suddenly, shaking Orochimaru out of his thoughts.

“Hardly,” the Snake Sannin scoffed, “You couldn’t match my intelligence if you tried.”

“I wasn’t talking about intellect,” the defector rumbled cheerfully. “You’re the one sent to kill Konoha ninja on missions even Black Ops doesn’t know about. A superior approached you, and next thing you know you’re the favored tool, doing more and more of the dirty work until you’re not sure you can even be considered a comrade anymore. Are you an enemy or an ally? Where can you go to be at peace with yourself? Am I right?”

“You’re implying I’m trapped, or that I was tricked into being here, but that’s hardly the case,” Orochimaru objected. “The work I’m doing is revolutionary. It protects the village as no other can.”

“Being trapped isn’t the same as not being able to leave,” Kisame disagreed. “Living in a false existence, where you can’t even define yourself. Where you’re even trapping yourself.”

“What do you want,” the older ninja hissed, cutting Kisame off even as he said the last word. “You must have a point, so get to it.”

“A mistrusted foreigner in a new place with few allies,” the blue ninja mused. “You were sent to kill me, or turn me to your master’s side. But a young medic with steel in her spine told me in Konoha I wouldn’t have to kill my comrades. And I could use a few comrades of my own.”

“You think I’d agree to an alliance? With the defector no one trusts?”

“The shadows of the Bloody Mist are pushing to make the war bloodier, longer.” Kisame’s hand reached up to grip the hand of the greatsword that had stabbed anyone who tried to take it away from him. “My ex-handler was one of the foremost of them, but he wasn’t alone. There’s whispers of unrest in Suna that forced their Kage to declare war, and here in Konoha there’s your group. So you tell me, who’s really pushing for war? Whose puppet are you really?” The defector smiled placatingly as Orochimaru clenched his jaw. “Besides, there’s not many here I can trust.”

“And yet you think you can trust _me_?” the pale ninja mused, “Even you can’t lie that well.”

Kisame just shrugged, “You seem like the trustworthy type.”

“You’re thinking of somebody else,” Orochimaru hissed, “One of the other Sannin the stories reported as me, perhaps.”

“Well, you’re the one still here, aren’t you?” The younger ninja asked seriously, then moved ahead, leaving Orochimaru reeling. The mission went off without a hitch, intel recovered, and he let the blue-skinned man live.

He was just considering it, Orochimaru told himself, not making a decision either way without more evidence. But that he was considering the offer at all, questioning the ethics of his experiments in a way he hadn’t in years, bugged him.

 

* * *

 

He smiled his best unsettling smile as he wandered over to her, but the medic just gave him a glance to see who it was then went back to packing her medical kit.

“I understand you requested to work with me specifically,” Orochimaru told her sweetly as she picked up the spare needles. “Planning to warn me away from your soulmate?”

“Kisame considers you a friend, or something, and I trust his judgement,” Rin told him as she ran each needle through a fire-palm jutsu before packing them away again. “I _asked_ for this mission because you’re headed to the front for the first time since the war started. Someone who’s been there should be with you on this mission. And you’ve come back from your last three missions _injured_. Kisame noticed, and I don’t know about you, but he implied someone from inside the village had been deliberately feeding you bad intel. I can’t make sure your intel’s good, but I’m a licensed medic, and I can provide backup.”

“So you made yourself a target for what? Because your soulmate and I are ‘friends’?”

She actually stopped what she was doing to glare at him then. “I’m coming along because you’re a comrade, and someone who’s supposed to have your back is trying to kill you. Even if Jiraiya and Tsunade thought it was alright to up and disappear in the middle of a war you stayed, and you should be celebrated for that. Instead the village seems collectively scared of you, as though you’re somehow scarier than the toad sage, who likes to crush his opponent with giant toads instead of using his brain, or Tsunade, who can take you apart with a chakra scalpel or punch you through a wall.”

She hissed out an angry breath, and Orochimaru stopped himself short of interrupting, honestly wondering how far she would go.

“And I didn’t really notice until Kisame mentioned it,” Rin continued apologetically. “Because you were never really around when I was younger, but people look at you the same way they look at him, when he’s a defector from an enemy village in wartime, and you’ve been a konoha shinobi your whole life!”

She took another ragged breath, then calmed down a little, looking back down at her supplies.

“You know, I really wanted to be Tsunade when I was little. I mean she’s a princess, and cool, and strong, and better than anyone else at medical jutsu. That’s why I was training to be a medic so young, and how I know so much now in spite of only just becoming a chunin. But, I don’t want to be her if all that strength also comes with giving up when times get hard and abandoning my friends. Even if I lose someone important, I would rather everyone else be there for me, than to… disappear the way Kakashi has.” She blushed slightly. “I’ve been thinking about it since Kisame brought it up and I’d much rather be like you. You’re always inventing things, and you have the most amazing summons. And when I was little I was always kind of jealous of your hair.”

He blinked at that, “Because my hair care skills are the best recommendation for someone to look up to.”

“At least you bathe regularly,” She huffed in embarrassment. “You forget I’ve met Jiraiya. I’m not sure he’s ever even seen the men’s side of the baths.”

Orochimaru’s laughing before he realizes it, and it’s a shock, actually painful a little along the sides of his throat. He stops as soon as he realizes what he’s doing, but Rin just flashes him a grin of her own and turns back to the last of her supplies.

He sits next to her for a while longer, offering his own - superior - fire jutsu mastery whenever she picks up anything that needs to be sterilized. Then he wanders away to take the first watch. By the time he wakes her up, an hour late for her own, he’s decided Danzo can target her all he wants, he will _not_ succeed.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And then Rin, Orochimaru, and Kisame end up in a fight against Danzo, with Minato and Kushina getting dragged in over time. They find out about Madara through him and end up rescuing Obito. And then… all sorts of other things happen differently? The End.


	4. I Can Feel You Lying

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Every lie your soulmate tells you is tattooed on your skin.

He had felt something when Yagura spoke, a tingling at the tips of his fingers, some lingering sense of wrong he’d never felt before. But it was only when the stranger in the shadows revealed himself and spoke that he realized why.

“I will create a place where you belong,” the shadows said, and each word was marked with the lingering pain of a needle against his skin. When he looked later Kisame knew he would find those same words across his wrists.

But there had been no other lies in what he said. This stranger truly believed they could be comrades, working together for a better Kiri, a better world. But Kisame wouldn’t follow even his soulmate on belief alone. He wanted a name.

“I am… Madara Uchiha,” the stranger offered after failing to distract Kisame from his question. And the burning of the words along his skin made Kisame grin and call him on the lie.

“I don’t believe you. Show yourself.”

The other hesitated short of saying no, reconsidered, and agreed.

 

* * *

 

It worked out somehow, following a man who lied about his name but not much else. Kisame managed to go a year or more without lying in return. A bonus of keeping ‘Madara’ in the dark about being his soul mate but more because it seemed like the wrong thing to do.

‘The name’s Tobi!’ inscribed itself on his wrist later, making Kisame take a second glance and realize the similarities. He tilted his head at the smaller man.

“Have we met somewhere before?”

“I don’t think so, I’d remember someone as scary as you.”

It burns across his skin, and Kisame smiles.

“Ah well, I guess I must have been mistaken then.”

And if Tobi freezes at that, his hand twitching as he avoids looking at it in shock, well, Kisame’s not about to call him on it.

 

* * *

 

In the end there’s only a handful more lies scrawling up Kisame’s arm. Tobi seems to try to avoid them after the big reveal. “It turns out that you will be the last to know,” joins the others when Tobi/Madara whatever his name is returns from the dead. But his apology for deceiving him doesn’t burn. Kisame’s almost glad, though he would have liked to keep those words for later.

“I had no idea. I never would have guessed you were Tobi,” Kisame says with a grin, lies all of them. Madara doesn’t even blink. Instead he hesitates when Kisame tells him knowing he’s pulling the strings makes things easier, because it’s not a lie.

“I shall continue to count on you, Kisame,” the other offers, truth. And Kisame grinned wider.

“The same goes for me.”

 

* * *

 

Obito keeps catching himself running his fingers over it after Kisame leaves, the last line of text burned into his skin. Only halfway up his arm all told, very few lies for how long they’ve know each other, and almost all of them some variant of his name, pointedly stated. Or a sarcastic ‘I believe you’.

But the last lie Kisame said before heading off on his mission?

“See you later.”

 


	5. Like Hitting A Wall

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Where you can’t lie to your soulmate.

“Just who are you?” Kisame demanded reaching back up to Samehada’s hilt as the stranger tried to talk him in circles instead.

“I am…” but he stumbled over the last word, and no sound came out, startling both of them.

“You… were about to give me a false name, weren’t you?” Kisame realized, grinning at the widened eye. The only part of his soulmate he could actually see.

“Shit,” the stranger managed, sounding 10 years younger and definitely spooked.

“Well hey, that’s a good enough reason to believe everything you’ve said up to this point,” Kisame pointed out, letting go of his new sword. “I’m in.”

“Just like that?” the stranger asked him suspiciously.

“If I wasn’t I wouldn’t have been able to tell you,” the older ninja pointed out cheerfully. “I wouldn’t say no to getting a look at who you really are, or a name, but seems like you’re the only one I can trust to tell me the truth.”

The Uchiha considered this for a long moment. “Lie to me,” he decided after a moment, “Tell me… tell me you’re the Mizukage.”

“I’m the…” And it was like running into a wall, but the pain was worth it for the realization in the other’s eye. A moment’s hesitation, then the other ninja sent Yagura away before slipping off his mask.

“My name is Obito Uchiha,” He offered once his scars were bared. “It’s good to… I wish we’d met in better circumstances.”

“Kisame Hoshigaki. When do we start?”

 

* * *

 

If anyone in Akatsuki noticed that Kisame was conveniently absent for almost all meetings Tobi attended they didn’t comment on it.

 


	6. Drawing In Sharks

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What you draw on your skin is on your soulmate’s skin as well.

It’s her first year in the Academy when Rin learns she and Obito will be together forever. She’s seen her parents writing on their arms to each other for years but they always stopped her when she tried to copy them, saying to wait until she was older. Of course that means the first recess at school she picked up her ink brush and drew a flower on her wrist, just to see what would happen.

Obito starts from his seat in front of her, glancing down at the matching flower that just appeared on his arm, and she’s too young to think of dating or romance as anything other than part of a fairytale happy ending, so she knows that being soulmates means they’ll be together forever. She grins and nods when Obito looks up at her in surprise, showing him the matching flower on her wrist. His grin is infectious, so she picks her brush back up and starts adding a stem and some leaves.

She starts when a fish with sharp teeth and butterfly wings is drawn on top of the large leaf she just finished.

A quick look over at Obito shows he has nothing in his hands that he could have drawn with. In fact, he’s looking at the shark-terfly with a confused expression on his face before turning to her questioningly. She just smiles and waves her brush at him, tucking her surprise away, and he laughs before going back to his lunch.

She draws a cat, and someone draws another shark chasing it, this one with a dog’s legs and curly tail. She giggles at it, and Obito glances at his arm as she does, laughing as well.

She wants to draw more, but the teacher gives a five minute warning and she has to put her brush down to finish her food. As she’s packing it away she checks the drawing again, and there’s a thorny bracelet circling her wrist with sharks instead of flowers. It makes her smile for the rest of the day.

 

* * *

 

Her parents catch her drawing on her arm again that evening and sit her down for a talk about how it can be dangerous to try and reach out to a soulmate before you’re a ninja able to take care of yourself. She listens as patiently as a 5 year old can, then tells them simply that Obito’s her soulmate, she saw her drawings on his arm at school today.

They’re even more insistent that she wait until she’s older then, because his family’s apparently not going to even consider her until she’s a strong enough kunoichi that they _have to_ acknowledge her worth. She tries to understand, and nods when they ask her if she does, but she can’t see why what she draws to her soulmates, those people whose souls were made for her and hers for them, is anyone else’s business. It’s harder to get away with it the next time, after they confiscate her brushes and ink before bed.

So she learns to sneak in little drawings while she’s studying or doing homework, just above the edge of her sleeve. Her drawings get better over time, and so do the sharks. Sometimes her second soulmate even adds other creatures, once an incredibly detailed picture of a seagull that makes her think they live by the sea. It’s better than anything she can do, and definitely better than Obito’s kunai drawings, so she’s determined to practice even more. She hopes her soulmate is at least a little older, and not just that much better at drawing, how embarrassing would that be?

 

* * *

 

They’re studying together, over at Obito’s house with his Grandmother as a chaperone, and Rin’s doodling tiny ladybugs on her arm for good luck. For each one a shark with antenna and spots is drawn in the spaces following, making her smile.

“Man, you really like sharks, don’t you Rin,” Obito comments after a glance at his wrist to see what she’s doing. She can’t help but laugh at that, even if a part of her feels bad that she hasn’t told him yet.

“Yea, I think I’m definitely starting too.”

 

* * *

 

For as long as Obito can remember, Rin has been his soulmate. She likes to draw flowers and twining thorns on her arms, eventually upgrading into medically accurate plants and poisonous creatures to watch out for. And when he draws her a shaky kunai or shuriken she smiles and twines flowers around it or decorates it with serpent carvings. It’s almost everything he ever expected from a soul mate.

Except for the sharks.

He’d really like to know why she always draws a shark disguised as an animal or plant after she finishes another drawing.

It’s a cute quirk though.

 

* * *

 

It’s been almost a year since Obito’s death, since she last saw a kunai sketched into the skin of her arm, and she’s panicking, tired and sore, in some lightless cell waiting for her captors to come back. She has just enough Chakra for a light in one hand, and form her chakra scalpel in the other. It’s not exactly designed to write with but she manages.

“I can’t get out. Don’t know what to do.”

It takes less than a minute for a familiar scrawl to scratch across her arm, starling her with how much it hurts with the shock of seeing it again.

“Rin?! What’s happening? Are you ok?”

And then, moments later in an unfamiliar hand.

“Where are you.”

It’s a relief, knowing they’re both there, Obito somehow not dead, not lost to her. But her chakra is slowly running out, and the second message is more what she needs right now.

“Somewhere in Kiri. They painted a seal on me, but it’s not finished yet.”

“Nonono, you have to get out of there before they finish it! Minato sensei should be able to fix whatever this is!” But he was gone, sent somewhere else along the front like always. She lifted her hand to say as much, but stopped as another message appeared.

“Tell me whatever you can about where they took you, I’m on my way.”

“They kidnapped me from the front, brought me across water in a rowboat. It’s been a day or so since. Damp but no water I can hear. I think I’m underground”...

Her chakra sputtered and died, but that wasn’t enough to find her. She searched the floor for something, anything to continue with now that her scalpel was gone, but came up empty. Her nails might be long enough.

She switched to her other arm to make sure she wasn’t writing over something in the dark.

“No light inside. Long hall. Dirt walls. Smell sea. Windy trees while coming in, sounded… strange. Whistling? Crow calls, not seagulls.”

It hurt and she was running out of space she was sure wasn’t crossing into other words. Hopefully that was enough of a clue to find her. For now she’d rest and try to recover some of her chakra. And if they came for her she’d just use it to gather more information about where she was.

She didn’t mean to fall into a fitful sleep, but the chakra drain must have been worse than she thought. She startled awake to the sound of combat coming down the corridor. A door being kicked in a moment later, then a curse and another round of fighting. Another lull and then it was her door being kicked in.

He was older than her, like she’d thought, but not by much, and blue in the light of his covered lantern. It was the gills on his arms and markings on his cheeks that caught her eye, however, and combined with the pointed teeth she could see why he liked sharks so much.

“You Rin?” he asked, picking her up without waiting for a response. The still swollen red lines on her arms must have been enough proof. “Konoha,” he mused, catching sight of her forehead-protector. “I dodged one of yours on the way in. Silver haired brat with a death wish. Left him holding off the reinforcements. I suppose you want me to go save him now?”

“Kakashi,” Rin breathed, and grinning was painful, but welcome. “I’d appreciate it.”

“Fine,” her rescuer grouched, offering her a chakra pill. “But we’d better do it soon. I may have accidentally released the Three Tails on my way in.”

“Yea,” she agreed, swallowing the pill quickly and getting her feet back under her. “I can heal whatever is needed as we escape.”

She heals the wounds on her arms, hoping that’ll be enough of a sign to Obito that she’s ok now. Still, she catches sight of Kisame jotting ‘Got Girl’ in wildly uneven letters on his arm while they run. Then he tosses his own forehead protector aside.

Not that it makes Kakashi any less suspicious when they catch up with him, but he doesn’t try to kill the older ninja on sight at least.

Her legs give out as they reach the water, and shark-guy catches her. He hands her a pen as Kakashi reveals the boat he has hidden, then takes command because he knows the waters here better than either of them. Kakashi’s too exhausted to argue beyond a distrustful glare, but she knows he won’t be able to rest until they’re back behind allied lines.

While their impromptu guide slips them past every patrol Kiri sends after them, Rin writes down her arm as small as she can, telling Obito everything she’s wanted to tell him since he disappeared. When she can’t fit anymore she turns her hand over and writes “Please come home” in the middle of her palm.

“I’m coming,” he promises, written in an arc around her request. Then circles it for good measure.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kiri’s in an uproar because the Three Tails is rampaging along one of their shorelines. Obito meets up with everyone before they make it all the way back to Konoha, and returning of a kidnapped member of team 7 and a dead member wins Kisame Minato’s thanks. Which means Kushina is bullying Sarutobi into letting him stay as a Konoha ninja, esp because her honorary genin team are ⅔ his soulmates. Fuguki later tries to assassinate Kisame as a traitor and is killed. Kisame takes Samehada from his corpse.
> 
> Also, Kisame is only a year older than them, if I have my information right. He's just better at drawing than either of the others.


	7. Feeling Nothing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Soulmates feel each other's pain.

He’d known something was wrong even before Madara told him, Just the sense of danger that being so close to another ninja for so long created, but he’d always clung to the hope it was more. The teachers in the academy said the amount of pain felt between soulmates varied, so maybe his danger sense was just a mild pain sensor?

But finally reaching the clearing, just as Kakashi impaled Rin through the chest, and feeling nothing? It proved without a doubt that they’d never been meant for each other. His body kept moving as his brain stuttered to a stop, he couldn’t hear the screams, couldn’t feel the blood as he killed all the attackers. Or maybe the whole battle just happened in perfect silence, engraved forever in his mind without sound or sensation to be reviewed again and again, but always as a blur.

The trees rained blood blocking out the moon, and Rin was dead.

But he couldn’t feel anything.

 

* * *

 

After that it wasn’t worth feeling anything again. The goal of a world of dreams, where everything was as it should have been, consumed his thoughts. He would never suffer emptiness again if he could only reach it.

There were no phantom pains to bother him as he went. His soulmate must be especially good at taking care of themself, or perhaps his own aches and pains were just strong enough that he couldn’t feel lesser ones anymore. So he ignored the idea of soulmates, didn’t bother empathizing with those whose soulmates he might be destroying, and dragged himself closer to that final dream every day.

Which is why the pain caught him by surprise. Worse than anything he’d ever felt, including being crushed alive, or being caught in Konan’s explosion, like getting ripped apart. He can’t breath, barely managing to keep enough chakra on his feet to stay above the waterline. It peaks, and this time it’s his mind struggling to process as his body blacks out. Because he can’t feel the pain anymore, suddenly, cut off as though it never happened. Like a puppet with no strings, the smallest sensations he was accustomed too didn’t exist any longer.

For the first time in his life there’s no dry itch along his neck, complaining about the dryness of the air in all but the wettest of weather. There isn’t the tension in his shoulders from muscles long used without proper stretches. He’d thought those pains were his.

Now they’re gone.

A shark arrived minutes later, charging out of the water head-on only to dissipate at the last minute, dropping a scroll into his collar. He fished it out, and unrolled it to read Kisame’s report, only to hesitate at the blood along the edges. Then the first raindrops started to fall, as Ame’s rains threatened to begin again. So he rolled it up and stuck it in his cloak. He’d read it when he made it back to base.

 

* * *

* * *

 

For Kisame there’d just been little things, paper cuts perhaps, or training accidents. Then suddenly a crushing, encompassing pain that shot through his entire side for days before letting up even slightly. He learned to walk deliberately, taking his time, and hide the winces when his soulmate moved. It added to his intimidating figure, he was told, so no one asked.

After that there was always pain, a lingering ache of scars pulling taught with every motion, the ache along healed seams when it rained. His soulmate was even more of a fighter than he was, to push through that.

It wasn’t that hard to guess when they met, even without the pain along a shoulder as Madara reached for his mask or the pull of spiral scars as his soulmate blinked. Still, it was reassuring that he could be absolutely sure.

He wished he could soothe some of that pain away, but in the end it only made him love the impossible man all the more fiercely. They were both survivors after all.

 


	8. Healing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> a.k.a the one that got way too long.
> 
> Soulmates share strong emotions and can take injuries from each other.  
> (Also, the universe wants to play matchmaker. Ignoring just makes it more insistent.)

No one remembers how it was in ages past, if having chakra always meant having an a soulmate. One of the side effects of using the forces of the world at a whim, apparently, the world likes to matchmake and you got its attention. But the longer ninja fought with chakra, the greater heights of strength and skill they reached, the more direct the bond became. By the time of the warring states period soulmates weren’t just able to help their soulmates heal faster with their proximity, they could actually take injuries from their soulmates. And within the last generations before the war ended they started feeling their soulmate’s strongest emotions.

Nowadays, in the years since the founding of the Great Shinobi Villages, such bonds were common, if not well understood. Ninja are incredibly private, unwilling to give the complete truth to anyone they don’t trust completely, especially with something as intensely personal as feeling a soulmate’s emotions. In dark corners of the second and third shinobi wars some of the less scrupulous experimented with how much of each emotion carried over, and how much they could influence one partner by controlling the emotions of the other, with inconclusive results. In the end it became just another truth all ninja were expected to know about without anyone telling them. Use your information gathering skills if you’re so skilled.

But there’s always the fear of someone getting into your head as a ninja, and the more paranoid worked on dampening their emotions as much as possible, so they didn’t leak anything across the bond. Some organizations, such as Kiri’s Hunter-nin Corps or Konoha’s Root, actually required their operatives to undergo such training.

Kisame wasn’t worried about his soulmate catching wind of something he felt. As far as he knew he didn’t have one, never having felt even a flicker of emotion across the bond. He just hadn’t seen any reason to resist the Kiri emotion-repression training at the time. After killing his heart again and again he graduated the top of his class, working his way quickly through the Swordsman’s Corps as well. He was faster than he looked, physically stronger and more resistant due to his bloodline, and no longer felt much strong emotion. A perfect soldier for the Land of Mist.

He was making a grocery run after another successful mission when he felt it, panicked distress shooting through him before it was tamped down to simmering upset. It wasn’t the uncontrolled emotion of an infant, or even a worldwise toddler, but more uncontrolled than he would expect from an adult. He didn’t know how soulmate bonds worked, maybe they only formed later in life and he just hadn’t know up until now.

But the unfamiliar intensity of emotion chafed at him for the rest of the day. Panic and upset dulling into the pain of loneliness, all with the underlying thread of ‘what do I do?’ Finally Kisame risked reaching out, trying to gather up some of his soulmate’s pain and make them at least calm down. Instead he got a bad scrape along the back of his arm.

But his skin was hardier than most, so it didn’t hurt, and his soulmate’s rush of relief was much better than constant low level panic. What he didn’t understand is why no one had seen this child, because he was convinced only a child could be that open and still be a ninja, and calmed them down, treated their wound. He couldn’t be the only one who had noticed, could he?

 

* * *

 

The next few times it happened he was startled but not surprised when reaching for pain to stop the panic brought accidental stab wounds, a sprained wrist, or scrapes and bruises. None of the injuries were all that bad, and his bloodline healed quicker than most, so he let his soulmate take solace in wounds being healed, even if no one was taking care of them for the kid.

He learned to draw over only some of the pain after a while, experimenting until he could get a sense for how bad the pain was as he drew it into him, leaving enough behind so he wasn’t incapacitated somehow and his soulmate didn’t suddenly develop super healing. Kisame also kept his ear to the ground, listening for any evidence that soulmates could heal each other long distance, but came up with nothing. He’d never heard of such an ability before, but he could understand why no one who could would admit it.

And he learned to feel his soulmate’s emotions without losing himself in their distraction. Most of them were things he couldn’t care enough about to feel that strongly, and the chance to experience them was both humbling and terrifying. How did people live that out of control of themselves? However, the longer he listened to the feelings in his head, spinning from hope and joy to drowning sorrow, the more emotional he found himself becoming. And the more likely to question everything being asked of him.

 

Ever since his last year in the academy Obito had healed quickly. A scraped knee would stop hurting much earlier than it did for the other kids, and be fully healed a few days earlier. The same wound on him and Kakashi cost Rin less chakra to heal on him, and he was less sore after a long day of training than either of his teammates. He’d tried to ask a teacher about it once, and gotten some half hearted answer about how using chakra might accidentally accelerate the division of cells in some situations and if he was really worried about it to talk to a doctor.

He didn’t bother, just kept track of how long it took his wounds to heal, checking the times against how long Rin estimated similar wounds might last. It was consistently faster but nothing too dramatic, so he tried not to worry too much about it.

(The simmering bloodlust curling around the base of his neck he couldn’t dismiss so easily. What was wrong with him that he had a killer who enjoyed it for a soulmate? But he kept it hidden, agonizing over never letting the faintest hint of it leak out, and tried to convince Rin she’d be happiest with him even if it wasn’t his emotions she was feeling.)

 

* * *

 

It was the middle of a mission, actually the middle of a fight towards the end, when he felt it. Anger and desperation, determination - crisp and clear headed -, then panic followed shortly by soul deep relief.

Then the darkest shock of fear he’d felt yet, followed by desperate panic, resignation, and an undertone of screaming denial as his soulmate tried to hide what must have been overwhelming agony.

He reached for the pain and stumbled as his knee tried to give out, only just turning the fall into a roll to take him out of range of an opportunistic kunai. After that he focuses on killing his attackers as quickly as possible, counting the seconds until they’re all in pieces at his feet and he can try again. Intel recovered, with no one alive to leak it, and the seal secured he leaves the clearing and any pursuers behind. Stopping as soon as he dares to reach out again, into the loneliness-resignation-fear that faded as his soulmate passed out.

When he limps back into Kiri a week later Fuguki asks what happened to him with a laugh.

“Rockslide jutsu,” Kisame replies, because that makes the most sense. “But the guy who did it is a lot worse off than I am.” Or at least he hopes so, but his soulmate is annoyed and chafing at boredom, so he assumes they at least lost them.

“So long as no one can reveal this scroll’s contents, it does not matter,” the older ninja decides, taking one last look at Kisame before sending him off to get medical attention.

They ask what happened to his eye at the hospital, and he tells them someone tried to cut it out. The medi-nin scoffs at the ‘tried’, puts something into the socket to hold the shape and sews his eyelid shut, slapping a patch on him before sending him on his way.

 

* * *

 

As he’s watching Rin die, Obito can’t focus on one emotion long enough to feel anything. His mind shuts down and he reaches for the only constant he can feel, falling to bloodlust in a way he never has before. He lashes out against every enemy ninja present, something stopping his strange power from touching Kakashi at the last minute, and he came back to himself standing between twisted trunks in a pool of blood, cautious worry and reassurance reaching out to him through the bond.

And for the first time ever he allows himself to reach back, taking the comfort offered without fear of the bloodlust at the edges of his thoughts.

His soulmate reaches back, clumsy and unsure, but the worry and care was honest.

Obito knelt to say goodbye to his first love, sharingan burning the image into his memory and crying blood even as his new one stayed dry. He’d been afraid of what he could lose if he didn’t follow the rules, rejecting everything too dangerous or risky out of hand. But now he’d lost everything he wanted to gain, while the soulmate he struggled to avoid comforted him from afar, not even knowing what had happened.

In the new world Rin wouldn’t have to die, he’d have his best friend back, and he’d have the chance to rediscover who he wanted to be. All he had to do now was get there. With a wave of gratitude for his soulmate he closed himself off again and turned away, headed back for Madara.

 

* * *

 

His soulmate’s breakdown was the last straw. Kisame nearly drowned in a flood of emotions stronger than any he’d felt before, across the bond or otherwise, yet when he reached out to try and take some of the pain none of it was physical. All he could do was focus on feeling as supportive as possible, not letting his training smother the worry he felt before it bled over into the bond.

Then, once his soulmate had crashed, recovered, and their emotions were simmering somewhat closer to the safe zone, they sent a wave of gratitude his way.

He sat in the darkness for a while, not bothering to get up and find the light, running the complicated emotions that simple moment of recognition triggered in him. But no answers were forthcoming. Instead he had to consider the issue for the next two days before he realized something that should have been obvious from the start: He spent more time worrying about keeping a soulmate alive and well than he did his missions. More than he cared about keeping his village safe.

There wasn’t a lot he needed to pack to bring with him, less he would bring because it’s something he wanted. So he was done packing before he’d really managed to think things all the way through.

So he hesitated just short of opening his door and walking away, leaning his head against the frame and really considering if this what he wanted to do. The answer was a resounding yes. Kiri just wasn’t his place anymore, and he had a soulmate out there he’d never met who could use the support. So he opened the door and stepped past.

Word travels fast in a ninja village, and while most saw nothing strange about him walking towards the gate with a pack others knew enough to realize he wasn’t scheduled for a mission right now. It didn’t take long for that information to reach Fuguki and him to worry what Kisame might get up to outside the village in wartime. The red haired swordsman wasted no time in gathering a few nearby underlings and heading for the gate. They arrived only seconds before Kisame did.

“Where do you think you’re going, Kisame?”

The smaller swordsman slowed to a stop, considering his former superior with a smile that grew into a grin showing all his teeth. “Well I've been feeling out of sorts lately, trapped in my own skin. So I figured I would go on a walking vacation, try to find myself again. Why? Are you here to stop me?”

“You must understand how this looks, Kisame,” Fuguki told him. “Leaving the village without orders in a time of war, you’d be branded a traitor and hunted down. Stop this foolishness and go home, I’ll find another mission for you to go on if you’re that bored.”

“Or I could just go through you and be on my way,” Kisame suggested mildly, drawing his sword before the older ninja could react fully. When the battle ended, seventeen Mist ninja lay dead, with more wounded, and Kisame Hoshigaki had escaped the Village Hidden in the Mist with the great sword Samehada strapped across his back.

 

* * *

 

Kisame doesn’t find his soulmate quickly the way he hoped. Turns out wandering the world as an S-Class missing-nin makes meeting most other ninja somewhat difficult. Instead he hefts his blades higher and sets out towards the nearest town whenever the mood takes him, trying to gather as many calm and positive emotions as he can as he travels the wilds and backroads, killing the hunter-nin sent after him along the way.

In time he becomes known as a force of destruction rivaling the tailed beasts, sometimes destroying large swaths of the local environment when the strongest chakra powerhouses are sent after him. Samehada becomes like a second set of eyes, keeping guard when Kisame has to sleep and just generally watching his back. They’re friends now. It turns out you can teach a weapon to stop and enjoy the peace of a perfect moment, or the colors of the sunrise over the ocean, fortunately for the both of them.

He’s enjoying life for the first time, getting as many good fights as he wants alongside quiet months to himself. And the not knowing suits him. He’ll find them when he finds them. For now he’ll settle for bleeding over ‘I miss you’ and ‘wish you were here’ in his best moments, and reveling in the quiet bloom of ‘thank you’ he sometimes gets back.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's more to this, but it was getting too long, so see next chapter.


	9. Healing: Bonus

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Part 2 of the last chapter. 
> 
> Sorry in advance, but I swear it gets better.

When they first met, Minato struck Kushina as sort of a push over. He was quick to look away whenever she caught him watching her, and always did his utmost to stay out of her way when someone ticked her off. As well he should! But it didn’t do much for her view of him. She wasn’t even entirely sure he could fight if he had to, sparring practice aside.

Then he tracked her down after she was kidnapped, and helped her outrun her captors after she broke free and he helped her beat them up. They’d been draining her chakra, and she thinks they might have been trying to release the Nine Tails (she doesn't want to know why), so he has to carry her part of the way back as well. She changed her mind about him somewhere around then.

That's also when he complimented her on her hair, _and_ when she caught him taking the cuts and bruises she gained in the attack. She slaps him for that, then has to fight down the urge to apologize when he stared at her in pained shock.

“I earned those bruises!” She tells him instead. “I fought, and when they heal they’ll make me stronger. If we’re going to spend the rest of our lives together then I never want you to try and take that away from me. Understand?”

“I promise,” he agrees with a smile. And she can’t believe she’s actually considering this, but…

“Alright then, tomorrow you can take me on a date. And there's better be no kidnappers this time!”

“What?!” He sputters, turning red before he suddenly jerks sideways. “I mean yes, of course. Or is it no…?”

She just lets him panic and settles her head against his shoulder, because she’s exhausted, not to smother a laugh.

“It’s just, we barely know each other,” Minato protests, still blushing. “Even if we’re soulmates, shouldn’t we court or something first? Get to know each other better?”

She can’t help but smile at that, a blush coloring her cheeks as well. “Yea? Well that makes sense to me. I guess you have my permission to court me, and you can start by taking me on that date tomorrow.”

He agrees quickly, but there’s a smile creeping onto his face. When they haven’t let her out of observation by the next day, he brings her flowers instead. Then smuggles her in ramen when she tells him to.

 

* * *

 

Minato stumbled as he finished Hiraishin, Naruto safely detached from the bomb that had threatened him. He flickered again, this time targeting one of the safehouses he and Hiruzen had set aside, wrapping his still screaming son in a blanket before forcing himself to teleport away again. But their attacker had taken Kushina and run in that small window of time.

He couldn’t afford to panic, so he tamped his emotions down as hard as he could, and set about tracking Kushina’s distinctive chakra.

Moments later it didn’t matter, as the Nine Tails’ chakra spread across the village. It was more than enough for Minato to follow, reaching the enemy’s location just in time to grab the love of his life and run.

“Kushina, are you ok? Did he hurt you?” the blond stammered as he lowered her onto the bed in the safehouse. “Look, he’s here, Naruto’s ok, he just wants you back.” He handed their son to Kushina, partly to reassure her and partly to keep her from continuing the struggle to get up.

“That absolute bastard,” she growled once Naruto was back in her arms. Did he think I wouldn’t recognise him because he changed his _hair_? I can still _smell_ him!”

“You knew him?” Minato demanded in shock, “Kushina, who was he?”

“Obito,” she bit out, shaking her head as Minato tried to come up with some other ninja by that name. “Your overly enthusiastic student Obito? The one we all thought died? He couldn’t bring himself to sic the Kyuubi on me, just because I called him by name.”

“Obito’s been alive?” Minato breathed, not quite able to believe what he was hearing. “He’s alive and he has a sharingan powerful enough to control the Kyuubi? And he’s _attacking Konoha right now?”_ He yelped, realizing that one of the greatest forces of destruction known to the Hidden Villages was headed right towards them.

“He said he needed the Kyuubi to make a world where no one ever died,” Kushina agreed with a frown, “Somehow… he knows about Rin. Wait! Where do you think you’re going?!”

Minato smiled back at her sadly. “I’m the Hokage. Konoha’s under attack and it’s my responsibility to be there to save it. But more than that, I’m Obito’s sensei. If there’s a chance I could talk sense into him, I have to try.”

Kushina frowned at him, unhappy with being left behind, before falling back on the pillows to curl protectively around their son. “Well, you’d better give him a few good hits before-hand, or you’re sleeping on the couch.”

“I’ll be back as soon as I can,” Minato agreed with a gentle smile. Then he was gone, flickering across the battlefield in search of his wayward student.

 

* * *

 

She didn’t see him again until he teleported the Nine Tails into the safehouse, pulling her and Naruto out just before the tailed beast bomb hit. She was already dying by then, her chakra bleeding into the void left behind and trying to fill the hole, to no avail.

“Kushina,” Minato managed between labored breaths. “Please, just hang on a little longer. I’ll erect a barrier now.”

“I can hold it, Minato,” she disagreed, throwing her chakra chains wide to catch the fox, the effort forcing her to cough up blood before she could continue. “Now, hurry. I don’t know how much longer I have before my chakra runs out, and it breaks free. Let… let me, at least, take it with me when I go.”

Her husband’s eyes widened when he realized it was too late, water collecting along the rim, but he nodded. “Alright. Here, hold on to Naruto for me.” With the permissions only recently granted him as hokage he summoned the Nine Tails Ritual Altar. Behind him Kushina chuckled weakly.

“It’s smaller than I remember. Strange that this time, I’m not afraid.”

She held Naruto out to him, and in that moment the Nine Tails attacked, determined to kill any who could seal it again. Minato leapt for his family, but there was another already appearing in the way.

Obito tore the demon fox’s arm off with that strange jutsu of his, before stumbling to his knees from the force of the blow. “Don’t just stand there, hurry up already!” He shouted back at them, and Minato nodded with a smile. He took Naruto from Kushina, then helped her to the altar. Then, as a side thought, he summoned Gerotora and gave him the key to take to Jiraiya. Kushina gave him a confused look, but he just smiled. Then, a long string of handsigns later and the seal was complete. It reappeared on Kushina’s belly as the Nine Tails disappeared, cursing them, and Minato picked Naruto back up.

He waited desperately for one moment, two, before Kushina doubled over and started coughing up blood again. It was too little, too late.

“Kushina, I’m so sorry, here.” He pressed Naruto into her arms with tears in his eyes. “Here, hold him for a while.”

“Oh, Naruto,” Kushina breathed, tears gathering in her own eyes. “I’m sorry, I don’t want to leave, I promise. And there’s so much I want to say before…” She cut herself off as the baby began to cry. “Shh, Naruto. I’m sorry. It’s going to be alright now. Just a little longer, so hang in there.”

“Listen to your mother,” Minato agreed, giving his son a kiss on the forehead. “She’s an incredible woman, and I’m lucky she chose me as her man. Lucky she let me be your father.”

“I’m the lucky one,” Kushina disagreed with a smile of her own. “I’m happy, because you loved me. So happy, because I love you.”

“I love you too,” Minato agreed, smiling even as the tears escaped down his cheeks. “And I’m sorry it ended like this.” He pulled her close, Naruto cradled between them, and kissed her one last time.

She didn’t realize anything was wrong until he collapsed backwards seconds later, and then the determination-love-goodbye in the back of her mind went deathly still.

“Minato!” She screamed, even as her shields fell. Falling to her knees beside him as Obito and those Konoha ninja nearby came running to her side. But shaking him only made blood trickle from his lips, his familiar chakra presence completely gone. “Minato you bastard, you promised!”

She only stopped when Naruto began to cry, letting Hiruzen pull them away to safety as Intelligence took Obito into custody. Kushina soothed her son in the privacy of the Sarutobi home, clinging to the 3rd whenever he could be spared. And he clung back, having lost his soulmate as well.

But when the council tried to put forward Danzo as a Hokage candidate three weeks later she marched into the meeting unannounced with a murderous look on her face.

“My husband sacrificed his _life_ for this village, you think I’m going to let _you_ muck it up?!”

 

* * *

 

Kushina didn’t forgive him immediately, the way Minato sensei had been willing to, but Obito was alright with that. He still couldn’t trace back the train of thought that had lead him to release the Nine Tails and attack the village where the last of his precious people lived. And with that lapse he’d cost her the one person who meant everything to her. But she refused to hear of his execution, insisting Minato would have wanted him rehabilitated, and had Obito sent to T&I to figure out how he’d been brainwashed. It was slow going, and he wasn’t sure everyone studying him was supposed to be there, but he kept the chakra sealing eyepatch on anyway and tried to comply.

If Minato-sensei had been right, then Madara had been watching him for years before arranging things just so he could tear him away from Konoha. It seemed crazy but… he couldn’t remember why he’d thought this was a good idea. And he really wanted to know what was worth so much that Minato-sensei had to die.

Kakashi was also avoiding him, somehow managing to get out of seeing him even when Kushina had walked him down by the scruff of his neck. He thought that might be a good sign that he’d screwed up.

 

* * *

 

Kushina didn’t like hate. It ate at her belly in a way she was worried would infect everything she did, and she struggled not to let it get out any further than that. Plus it made Naruto cry when she let herself stew.

But more than hate she really didn’t want to forgive. Obito was hard, she wanted to just hate him, but Minato had wanted to save him instead. So here she was trying to save someone she would honestly rather have killed at the moment. Worse was the Nine Tails, because she _agreed_ with it now.

Every time Obito came into sight it’s hackles went up and it growled. And every time they left the younger ninja’s cell it was on edge but visibly relieved. When she had nightmares of Minato’s death, over and over, sometimes it jumped in to hijack itself and tear the Uchiha apart, and she _liked_ those dreams.

Which is why, when it suddenly shouted at her to close her eyes and chain the bastard up _right now_ she actually obeyed without questioning it too much. (Actually it went more like “Why should…” “Do you want a repeat of last year?! I _know_ that chakra, grab him now!”)

Turns out she got ahold of him right before he managed to pull the eyepatch off, ranting in that unfamiliar deep voice from the night of the attack. It set her hair on edge, and she was seconds away from just killing him and being done with it when the Nine Tails spoke up again.

“Normally you know I’m all for killing this guy, but thought you might want to know that’s not your friend.”

“I’m not blind,” Kushina scoffed, making the ninja nearest her inch away slightly. “And he’s standing right there. You trying to tell me someone genjutsu’d themself as him just to break into T&I?”

“No, that’s _Madara_ standing there. The chakra signature is the same. Possession seal maybe, I don’t know. Not like I’ve had much chance to study up on them lately.”

And that was enough to give her pause. In spite of the Nine Tails’ dismissive attitude it was practically radiating need-to-know. She was curious too, and this might be the breakthrough they’d been looking for in unraveling the younger ninja’s brainwashing.

“You,” she barked, turning to face the nearest Konoha nin, “Go get me a Hyuga familiar with spotting seals. You! Get me a medic. Now!”

They stared at her for a moment, clearly hesitating over obeying of following proper chain of command. But before she could blow up at them Inoichi Yamanaka stepped forward from the gathering crowd with a lopsided grin.

“Come on, you really want her mad at you? Let’s go.” And with a respectful bow of his head he was gone. The others quickly followed. With a huff, Kushina turned to the next ninja in line.

“And you, get me a pad of paper and something to write with.” She smiled as they ran and turned her attention inward. “Now, tell me what you know about possession seals. No not you,” she told the flustered interrogation specialist with a sweet smile, “I was talking to the Nine Tails.”

They let her be in a hurry after that.

 

* * *

 

Kushina had been acting Hokage for almost two years when her research into possession seals accidentally turned up evidence that Root might still be in operation. The trail turned up nothing on that front, but did reveal the Snake Sannin Orochimaru’s illegal experimentation on children in an attempt to recreate the 1st Hokage’s Mokuton. Hiruzen failed to kill his protege, but managed to chase him from the village, and while the child Kinoe was rescued Root went back underground.

Pursuit of the Sanin similarly failed to turn up the desired results. But like the previous investigation a completely separate set of vital intel was discovered. The Slug Sannin Tsunade was located in a town on the border of the Land of Fire, only just arrived and ready to hit the gambling dens.

Kushina handed Naruto to Hiruzen for the week and went herself. By the end of the weekend the two women were the most terrifying of friends, and Kushina had managed to gamble well enough that Tsunade had to accompany her back to Konoha to pay back the favors she owed the younger woman.

The Legendary Sucker ignored all greetings and offers of welcome on her arrival in the village, instead grabbing the first Hyuga she saw and dragging Hizashi with her to T&I to check on Obito. Between the two of them, and Hiashi when he came looking for his brother, the discovery of the seal around his heart took less than an hour. Working out a secure way to remove the seal without shattering his heart took almost two weeks (with time worked in for drinking and sleeping breaks). Actually managing it took days, and left the younger Hyuga brother with a new appreciation of the medical field.

It was around this time that the council finally managed to drag Tsunade into a meeting and offer her the position of Hokage. She laughed until she was crying, then accepted just long enough for the paperwork to be signed before abdicating and declaring Kushina her successor. She left the uproar that followed with a casual wave and the order not to bother “putting my face on that hill.” Then she checked into a hotel for the night, planning to be gone the next day.

She never did manage to leave.

Naruto turned three just in time to see his mother dawn the Hokage hat officially, followed by a full month of having to share her with paperwork and whatever else had been piling up the last two years. He stole her hat for a day, and they worked it out.

 

* * *

 

Kisame wasn’t sure what to made of the bleeding ninja who dropped out of the trees in front of him. He (maybe?) seemed to be trying to glare the taller ninja down, and was startled when Kisame only grinned at him.

“You look like you could use a hand,” The blue ninja offered, dropping his hand from Samehada’s hilt and holding it out. The stranger studied it calculatingly for a long moment before reaching out and gripping, hard. A test of strength maybe, or a macho thing, but it’s not hard enough to hurt. His lack of response makes the other man glance at his scars curiously before sighing and letting go.

“If you’re going to kill me, at least do it while you actually have the advantage,” He grumbles, but lets Kisame pick him up with minimal fuss.

“When you’re already dead, you mean?” The ex-Kiri nin asks with a chuckle, used to that kind of talk in Mist. All he gets in reply is a disapproving grumble, and his new acquaintance makes a good show of faking sleep. It’s no use calling him on it, so Kisame just puts the Land of Fire at his back and starts walking.

 

* * *

 

Orochimaru comes out of a light doze annoyed that he even let himself get comfortable enough to get that much sleep. But his unexpected travel companion left a medical kit within arms reach and put himself in the shadows around the cave mouth to keep watch. He turns to watch as Orochimaru opens the kit and peruses the contents, using trace amounts of chakra to test each compound for poisons or fakes, but they’re all valid as far as he can tell. And given with no strings attached, it bugs him.

“You didn’t kill me,” he complains, shoving the box away from him angrily. His rescuer grins that toothy grin again.

“Missing-nin. I only kill who I want now.”

“And I’m just not worth it to you?” the Sannin scoffs. “Do you even know who I am? Or are you just stupid?”

“Konoha’s Snake Sannin, one of the legendary three, you’re hard to miss.” The single white eye crinkled cheerfully at the corners, “Too interesting to kill. I’d much rather have someone to talk to.”

“You mean interrogate,” Orochimaru spat, “As though I’d let you get away with it.”

“I mean talk,” the blue-skinned man disagreed easily. “No one to get intel for anymore. For instance, what’s got you on the run? Your headband looks halfway to missing-nin already, but that might just be battle damage.” He gestures to his slashed Kiri forehead protector and Orochimaru reaches instinctively for his.

It’s pitted and scarred from the explosion, and covered in soot. But it’s the jagged scrape he was referring to, slashing from the symbol of the leaf and out to one side. It does look like someone tried to banish him from the village, while blindfolded, and drunk.

“Those fools wouldn’t take me back,” Orochimaru declares, throwing it away from him with more force than necessary. “I experiment on a few children and suddenly that’s the last straw.”

“Well, I’ve been looking for a travel partner,” the blue ninja offers easily in reply, hardly even taking a breath to consider the offer before giving it. Orochimaru can’t help but stare at him incredulously. His eyes narrow dangerously when all he gets is that same maddening grin.

“And what do you get out of this?”

“The cure to loneliness?” Came the offhand reply. Like admitting that was nothing. Like they were merchants going the same way who happened to meet on the street.

“Then get over here and help me with this,” The Sannin ordered, waving the medical kit violently and looking determinedly away.

“Kisame Hoshigaki and Samehada.”

“... Excuse you?”

That damn grin again. “My name. Kisame Hoshigaki. And this is my sword, Samehada.”

“Just the one? You didn’t name both of your blades?”

“Well, Samehada talks back.”

 

* * *

 

They travel together for the next week, and the whole time Orochimaru waits for Kisame to finally reveal his game. The inevitable request for a favor, betrayal, or something of that ilk. But it doesn’t happen. Finally he’s annoyed enough to try grabbing the the man and shaking answers out of him, only to recoil with a hiss when his hand brushes past the apparently talking sword.

“What was that?!”

“Samehada,” Kisame replied with a shrug, stopping and glancing back at him. “It eats chakra.”

“You’ve been feeding that thing off my chakra, haven’t you?” Orochimaru hissed, his eyes narrowing. But Kisme just grinned again.

“Nah, it doesn’t like the taste of yours. I’ve been feeding it mine.”

What.

“What?” The Sannin demanded. “You’re trying to tell me you’ve been giving up a portion of your own chakra to that blade the whole time we’ve been travelling together? Do you have any sense of self preservation at all?”

Kisame’s grin widened until he could see the individual teeth. “If it comes down to a fight, Samehada’s all too happy to help out. If that’s what you want you’d be better off poisoning me first, though it’s harder to kill my family than most.”

“Which explains your impossible survival,” Orochimaru inferred, glancing pointedly down at the injured half of his body. “How did you get those anyway?”

“Don’t know, they weren’t mine,” the younger ninja told him honestly. And Orochimaru tensed.

“Ah, from your soulmate then. Did they not tell you how they got themself mangled? Seems poor form when you’re taking the damage for them.”

“Never met them.”

Orochimaru nodded once before the words sank in, then his head shot up to check the sincerity on Kisame’s face. “Impossible. Injury transference without knowledge of the wound? Or even the giver's identity?! Ignoring for a moment that transference without skin contact has never been successfully proven in the first place, how can you do that for someone you have never and might never meet? For a stranger you might one day die for?”

“Stopping them from panicking, even just for a moment, is worth it when I can feel it happen and know that was me,” Kisame decided after a minute’s thought. He studied Orochimaru’s face as the other’s mouth snapped shut and he nodded, avoiding eye contact. “You haven’t met your soulmate, have you?”

“That’s hardly your business.”

“You feel them there, though. Makes you almost wish you still knew what emotions were.”

The Sannin hissed angrily at that, but didn’t deny it. Kisame didn’t push, and finally the older ninja brushed past him only to hesitate at the edge of the clearing.

“And you really think it’s worth it?”

“Worth losing the eye,” Kisame grinned. Orochimaru’s head turned at that, gaze flickering to the black eyepatch then away again with a huff.

“Well? Are we going or not?”

 

* * *

 

Kisame wasn’t sure exactly when he first noticed, but getting a name to go with the darkness that dogged Orochimaru’s steps seemed a decent enough time to bring it up.

“So, Danzo.”

The Snake Sannin cursed as his next blow was a bit off center and retaliated by smacking Kisame in the chest with the empty hand. “What about it?”

“Well, why aren’t we thwarting every plan he makes?”

Orochimaru hesitated short of throwing another kunai and let his hands fall to his side as he considered that. “Kisame, how are you at counterintelligence work?” he asked finally.

“Better than I look,” Kisame grinned, and they were off.

 

* * *

 

It’s somewhere in their 6th year together that Orochimaru looks over their temporary camp and comes up with 10 different children they’re personally responsible for.

That’s not even counting the loosely allied missing-nin they’ve picked up, some of whom have taken other orphans of potential they picked up the last few years. In fact, he’s expecting another group tomorrow, now that some of his operatives have located another Root training base to attack. They’ll be taking as many of the trainees as they can, and he can’t figure out where they’re going to put them during deconditioning without a proper facility or a few chakra sealed tents.

“When did we start carting a small orphanage around everywhere we go?” He asks when Kisame comes back from patrol. It comes out just as scathing as he’d wanted it too, but that only makes Kisame smile fondly as he looks out over their camp.

“Maybe we should find a place to settle down and start handing out headbands,” the swordsman offers teasingly.

But Orochimaru’s seeing the possibilities suddenly. Finding a place where the local lord will support the founding of a ninja village. Their children are loyal, and with training (and more space for medical research in some cases) they’ll serve for life. And serve well.

Kisame’s watching him when he blinks out of his thoughts, considering, and Orochimaru cracks a smile.

“We’re going to need to pick a symbol first.”

 

* * *

 

It’s Tayuya who comes up with it in the end.

She overhears them throwing ideas back and forth, debating the line between too impersonal and so obvious their respective nations will be sending hunters before they even get the village set up. Something about snakes and sharks both having scales, and she asks if they’re arguing about animals or music.

A short conversation about the different methods of writing music and Kisame laughs every time he sees the design, but they have a symbol for their village. And a name.

 

* * *

* * *

 

The plan is in place, years in the making and carefully choreographed so all the possibilities they can come up with are in their favor in some way. For the first time in years, Kisame moves openly down the streets of a Hidden Village. He’s recognized immediately, now one of the highest ranking missing-nin in the world, but that’s the point. They all know him on sight, but none of them can make a move against him. He’s the sensei of the Otogakure team for his village’s first official chunin exam. None of Konoha’s loyal ninja can touch a hair on his head, and the Kiri ninja can’t try anything or risk their alliance.

Danzo must have heard he’s there by now, and there’s no doubt he’s planning something, so Kisame keeps his head high and makes sure to show off all his teeth when he grins back at the hostile glances.

The more trails Orochimaru can follow back to the crafty bastard, the better.

He’s got a good feeling about this one.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So the Uchiha Massacre never happens. Orochimaru is actually trying to convince me to make Itachi or Shisui his soulmate, but I don’t want to add another 10 pages trying to figure that part out.  
> And have an image I cobbled together of [Obito](http://roedusk.tumblr.com/post/154124933975/found-this-this-morning-and-decided-to-finish-it) with his hair short again and Kisame's eye. 
> 
> Sorry for any spelling errors, or weird wording. (I got exhausted trying to finish it and decided not to bother editing.) 
> 
> Hope you enjoyed!


End file.
